A Life of Violin Music

Yibin Li 李艺彬

Chinese-born violinist Yibin Li has been playing violin since she was 5 years old -- her career is the product of a life in music. She has appeared in the United States, Europe, Canada, and Japan, and performed as a soloist with renowned orchestras in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. In addition to performance, Li is a passionate educator, teaching violin and music theory at institutions in the US and China.

As a soloist, Ms. Li has performed in China with the Beijing National Symphony Orchestra, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, and Taiwan Symphony Orchestra. In the United States, she has had solo performances with San Diego Grossmont Symphony and with Hunter Symphony in New York City. She also performs chamber music with groups in New York City, China and Europe.

Li is on the violin faculty at Mannes School of Music The New School, The Juilliard School Pre-College, and a visiting professor at both Xi'an Conservatory of Music and Beijing Central University for Normal Studies. She has been on the faculty of the Bowdoin International Music Festival, the Portland Bach Virtuosi Festival, and was a founding faculty member of the first Xi'an Bowdoin International Music Festival. During her residency at Xi'an Conservatory in 2011, she gave several master classes, ran workshops, and played recitals.

Ms. Li enjoys playing chamber music whenever possible, with both a quartet and a pianist partner. She has played chamber music concerts in New York at many venues, including shows she directed and programmed at Opera America, Merkin Hall and the Scandinavia House, New York from 2009-2011. As “Shanghai Duo,” she was an artist-in-residence for chamber music at the Banff Arts Center in Banff, Canada in Summer 2006. She was a violinist in the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra from 2004 to 2006. In both 2015 and 2016, she traveled to 20 cites for concerts in major performing arts centers in China.

Extending her performance experience to acting, she starred in Parisian theater director Irina Book’s theatrical piece, La Vie Matérielle. Premiering in 2010 at the French Institute Alliance Francaise in New York City, the piece later enjoyed a month-long, sold-out run at La MaMa Theater.

Accolades won by Ms. Li include first place in the Artist International Competition in New York City in 2001, the Syracuse University Concerto Competition in 1999, the Shanghai Chamber Music Competition in 1990, and the International Young Violinist Competition in 1986. The Chinese Musical News called her "a new rising star" after her solo debut in Shanghai. Her strong series of string quartet performances on Radio China prompted critics from Chinese Musical News to compliment her "versatility and marvelous imagination." Taiwan News hailed her nationally televised solo performance as "brilliant rendering of the violin repertoire."

Ms. Li recorded commercial CDs for the China Record Co, which are currently in distribution throughout China and Taiwan. These recordings include the Bach Violin Concertos in A Minor and E Major, and the Mozart Violin Concerto in G Major. She also recorded the premier performance of "Hong Hu" Violin Concerto by Chinese famous composer Zhanhao He with Shanghai Symphony Orchestra.

Upon her graduation from Shanghai Conservatory, Ms. Li was invited to join the faculty as a tenured professor in violin, where she stayed for 6 years. In New York, Li is an assistant teacher for Professor Lewis Kaplan at The Juilliard School, and violin faculty at Mannes School of Music Prep / Evening Div, The New School.

Ms. Li earned a graduate diploma from The Juilliard School, as well as a Master's degree in Violin Performance from the Mannes School of Music. Her teachers include Lewis Kaplan, Earl Carlyss, Seymour Lipkin, Peiwen Yuan and her father Qing Li. She gave her New York debut at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in 2001.

She lives in Greenwich Village, New York City with her husband, her daughter, and her cats Mimi and Waitress.